


A New Form of Commerce

by wordstrings



Series: A Brief Culinary History of Time [2]
Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Angst, Crowley Loves Kids (Good Omens), Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Food, Hurt/Comfort, Ineffable Husbands (Good Omens), M/M, So much angst
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-31
Updated: 2019-10-31
Packaged: 2021-01-15 21:50:41
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,783
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21260198
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wordstrings/pseuds/wordstrings
Summary: Crowley has a lousy night, and Aziraphale shows up with something new to taste.  Rampant h/c fluff, no sex yet, this timeline is the real world's timeline, I can't buy the six thousand years business if I'm doing a history of food, my apologies and kisses.  Also this is a birthday present for withoutawish.





	A New Form of Commerce

**Author's Note:**

  * For [withoutawish](https://archiveofourown.org/users/withoutawish/gifts).

**1560 BC:** Crowley was sleeping, which he discovered he liked nearly as much as the angel liked food (_his_ angel, he wanted to say, he wanted, oh he wanted, but he wisely kept that doubtless revolting piece of information to himself), when something appeared in his bedroom, a force he could feel like a skittering of fire along his skin, and he launched himself to a sitting position with his long single red braid all mussed and fuzzy from slumber, and an absolutely garish look on his face. Entirely exhausted. And very alarmed.

"Oh, Crowley." Aziraphale was wringing his hands. 

This was never, ever a good sign.

It took a moment for the memories to flood back. Last afternoon, and why he threw himself into sleep, and that couldn't possibly be why the angel was here. Aziraphale must surely want something. And it could not possibly have anything to do with _him_, other than asking a favor. Crowley was wrecked inside, teeth clenched so hard in his sleep that his head ached and a vicious crick in his neck and his throat sore with straining not to scream threats and turn into a slavering hellbeast and frighten the shit out of all of the bastards, and he was pretty sure there was drool on his pillow, but at least he wasn't in_ last night_ anymore, and that was something to celebrate.

And now there was a perennially gorgeous angel standing next to the light desert bedsheet, about three inches away from his left foot. Wanting something or other.

Well, if he did, then Crowley could bloody well pull himself together. Another miracle, surely he could accomplish that if it was for the angel. He saw Aziraphale more frequently now, the gaps between their meetings measured in decades instead of millenia, Aziraphale wanted something and Crowley gave it. Time, attention, a quick chat, a bottle or two of a good vintage over good food he barely touched, didn't matter, Aziraphale could ask for the metaphorical ash-scarred heart in the demon's chest that didn't actually exist and he would cock his head, reach inside, and hand it over on a solid gold platter.

_You're startled, that's all. Get a grip for Satan's sake. _

"Angel." Crowley looked down, found himself shirtless, and miracled himself a nicely soft black linen bedshirt, having not the slightest idea where on Earth (or an ethereal plane) this was going. "What in hell's name are you doing here? Are you all right?"

"Oh. Well. Perfectly all right, I suppose, perfectly. It's just that."

But the angel's forehead was doing that thing where he looked like he belonged next to the word FRET in the dictionary, when dictionaries will be invented, and Crowley was not thinking straight, so he muzzily patted the edge of the bed next to him.

"Please do sit down," he requested in his plummiest angel accent, recovering slightly.

Aziraphale hadn't yet discovered sarcasm, but he would master it one day, Crowley was certain. He sat with a heavy sigh. His clothing was costly and foreign, soft ivory lined with patterns of gold thread at the edges of the sleeves, and it still had absolutely nothing whatsoever on his hair, which looked like sodding spun April sunlight, and Crowley might not have been an angel anymore but he was very emotionally invested in aesthetics, and it was always a surprise. Always. He wanted to bury his face down and breathe it for a few months.

_No, six. At least. _

"Well," Aziraphale sighed at last into the weirdly comfortable silence, "if you _must_ know, I wanted to share with you some news about what the humans have been doing, but now I'm here, it's...it's so frivolous. You'll think me mad."

"Too late." Crowley smirked, squinting his ugly eyes in a way he hoped was charming.

"Oh, well." Aziraphale fidgeted. It was adorable. "I arrived here, and you see I've been in Mesoamerica for a while. Well. About a hundred years, actually, they're very kind and I suppose I settled in a bit--no direct word from Above to move along and get on with blessing someplace else, you see?"

Crowley did see. He smelled even better though, and there was something entirely new about Aziraphale's aroma. It was coming from his pocket, he imagined, though he couldn't be quite that precise.

"But now I've actually arrived in Egypt, I didn't know that they were...were conquering at this rate! People slaughtered everywhere. Nubia. The Levant. I've been a bit distracted I suppose, so I didn't notice it at first from an ocean away, what with all the other sensory discoveries going on, that you were, well...not well."

Crowley blinked. "I'm not well?"

"No, not at all."

"Wait, wait, shit, wait. What other sensory discoveries?"

"I don't want to talk about it now," Aziraphale said primly, folding his hands in his lap. "They're killing people, Crowley. And you--I think that since I'm on Earth to be thwarting you, and you're on Earth to, to foment, that means I can sense you rather well. And I can well assume that Egypt invading Nubia and the Levant are your demonic work, that's just your nature I suppose, being Fallen, but Crowley, several hours ago..."

"Oh," Crowley sighed. "Let me get this straight. You were exploring sensory perception, likely of the culinary sort, God knows you're not one for interior design."

Aziraphale huffed softly and Crowley waved his hand in a possibly over-the-top manner at his smallish flat in Khartoum. It was pristine, a rush-filled mattress and exactly one statue of a large sacred obsidian cat that Crowley thought was smiling suspiciously like Aziraphale (all cream and pleasure and delight on its lips, and nothing whatsoever to apologize for), two shelves with immaculately arranged vases, a wall hanging covered in hieroglyphics that Crowley thought exceptionally precise and well-executed (a prettily written pagan incantation from a fifth century temple), and a counter well-stocked with sweet unhopped beer, the malty sort the locals favored, and several bottles of more difficult-to-come-by wine. Nobody in their right mind would drink water out of the Nile, so the Egyptians took fresh rye bread and ripped it to pieces, fermenting it in jugs and then using a fine colander to strain out the icky bits. Clever.

_The sort of thing the angel might like, idiot. Where are your manners?_

"D'you want a drink?" Crowley asked. "You're here. I'm awake. The resources are available."

"Oh, that would be lovely, thank you." Aziraphale put his hand softly on Crowley's knee before he could untangle himself from the sheets, and a sort of sparking frizzle shot through the demon. "But wait, I wanted to say--when I saw all the invading and iniquity going on around here, I wondered...well, what had happened. What part you played in it. Then I could feel you last night, though, before I wrapped up my affairs with the Aztecs, and you were. Crowley, what happened?"

Crowley swallowed. He didn't want to think about yesterday. Yesterday could go straight to fucking Heaven as far as he was concerned, and he fell asleep afterward as fast as he could.

"They, um. Hnnmk. The Egyptians have found an interesting form of commerce, speaking of Nubia."

"Crowley," Aziraphale insisted, the grip on his knee tightening.

_Do not do that. Do not let me feel how fucking powerful you truly are. I will eat all the light and the good in you, sap your strength and take it for myself, take all of you, roll over for you and ruin you, and then I'll come back to my senses and it would have been worse than Falling. You'll be sucked dry, nothing but shadows. At least when I Fell, I only lost my Grace. Not yours. Never yours. _

Crowley coughed discreetly and fairly leaped out of bed to pour their drinks. When he glanced behind him, Aziraphale was...not pouting, surely angels didn't pout, but the expression was alarmingly similar. It made something twist deep in the demon's belly. Something snakelike and innate, now.

He downed half a glass of the rich beer, poured himself another, and then one for Aziraphale in the rather charming pottery mugs he collected with cool, clean black designs etched into the brickish red. They went rather well with his hair, he imagined. And his tattoo, come to think of it.

_No, no thinking of it. Please for the love of all that's wicked, do not think about that. _

"Other humans have done it before, of course. I mean it's not _new_, or anything." Crowley sauntered vaguely back toward the bed, reaching out a long arm to pass the angel his refreshment. "In other places. You've seen it, I'm sure. Well, what with the orders from Below and all, I had to muck about with a new trade arrangement, didn't I? There were a great many truly stroppy people afterward who didn't get what they wanted because I ruined the supply. Stock. Whatever. All sort of fuss. And what with the wars and all, everyone's a bit on edge, and so I thought...well, hang it, I'm a bloody demon after all, it's my job to ruin everything, so I. Ruined something. Felt nice, dunno why you're in such a--"

"Crowley," Aziraphale said, turning more fully to face him. Now the voice had a bit of an edge to it. A flaming sword's edge.

_Shit shit shit shit shit,_ thought Crowley, and shot the rest of his drink down his throat.

"Nubians," he said thinly. This was too much to discuss with his eyes bare, and he snapped into his hand a pair of the smoke-colored quartz sunglasses he'd found in twelfth century China. He had fifteen pairs originally, and thirteen of them were left. They made the humans more comfortable. "They were selling Nubians. Like...like they were goats. The ones who were defeated in battle."

"Slaves," Arizaphale said, exact as ever. His voice was cold when he uttered the word, as if it froze his tongue. "You were in...some distress, Crowley. What did you do?"

Crowley sighed, remembering. The smell of the slave market that also sold cattle, _oh and here's a pig and here's a chicken and here's a human_, jolly good, and the eight children lined up in numbered lots, with skin that reminded him of Eve's, and how he missed Eve, how often he'd curled up on a warm branch and talked to her, and how much he hated this fucking planet at times. The kids were siblings probably, at least some of them, but they wouldn't be purchased together, not unless someone impossibly rich showed up, and even then, they would be forever indebted, working for nothing, lower than garbage, and Crowley knew exactly how that felt. Their hair was done in elaborate braids, threaded with beads, one was being beaten with a thin reed for who knew what reason, and Crowley couldn't bear it any longer.

"I miracled an auction lot of eight children back to Nubia." He lifted one shoulder, slouching back down onto the bed. He felt better with the glasses on. He could be close to the angel again, now the glasses were on. "Ermp, nooooo, ssssorry. Technically eight auction lots. Back, y'know--just back."

"You transported eight human souls, intact, that distance, all at once? And you're still standing?" Aziraphale asked, incredulous. "Crowley, my dear boy."

"Yeah, well. Nnnm. S'why I'm tired, angel."

"However did you explain it, though?"

"I didn't, really...I just miracled a lot of forgetting, and then the people were miffed there wasn't anyone to, you know. Buy."

"Crowley, accessing that much power is incredibly draining!"

"Kids," Crowley sighed. "You can't...you can't sell kids."

They fell quiet. Aziraphale pursed his lips, his eyes losing their frozen edge. Crowley knew it hadn't been directed at him, not really. The angel tasted his drink, smacked his lips unselfconsciously.

"Yum," he announced.

Crowley wanted to laugh, and discorporate, and possibly melt.

"Oh! Yes, here. I did want to share something with you, but. Then I was worried."

_About the humans,_ Crowley thought. _You were worried about the humans and the lives they would lead. I understand. _

Aziraphale sucked at his plush lower lip for a moment before producing what looked like a long seed pod. It smelled...

_That smells like absolutely nothing I have ever scented in any lifetime, let alone as a snake. _

"What issss that?" Crowley wondered, taking it. Up close, it was a hideous wrinkly shriveled thing, but it smelled divine.

"It's an orchid, technically." Aziraphale smiled at him, and the smile fucking glowed, and Crowley really couldn't be expected to take much more of this, not in his condition. "But you can eat it! Isn't that amazing? They're selling it all over the place these days, speaking of new forms of commerce. It's incredibly expensive because it's so difficult to produce, apparently. I got it wandering through Omeca, along the coast you understand, bit of a pleasure trip really, but I'd a miracle to perform, and anyway they were eating this, and oh you can't imagine, my dear."

_I can imagine a lot,_ Crowley thought grimly,_ especially when you call me that. _

"It's sacred in certain areas. They put it these little amulets, you see, darling things they wear as jewelry, to protect them from the evil eye. That's rubbish of course, but the temples smell lovely. But now they actually _consume_ it, quite recently they discovered this, and I tried some, and I had to show you, and now here you are and all of this Nubian business is very serious and the tone is entirely wrong. Dreadfully. This is no time for frivolity. But then again, trying it might make you feel better," he added, his eyebrows lifting.

_Perfect fucking gorgeous creature, I want to try you, with a spoon, with a great bloody ladle, with my fangs, but I'm poisonous. So I'll settle for your gifts, then._

It wouldn't be so very difficult, Crowley thought. It would be better tomorrow, after more rest. More time with the angel. More time to grow used to him. He always accomplished it. Quite quickly, too. His mask was comfortable now, familiar. He could do it again.

"How in the name of the devil would you go about eating this?"

"Oh, simplicity itself! Simply cut the pod open, scrape out the beans, and heat some milk. Add sugar. And there you are."

"Whassssit called, then?"

"Vanilla," Aziraphale said gently.

Crowley looked down at the pod, trying to tamp down his breathing.

"I'm...sorry about what happened yesterday," the angel continued. "Look, I've a smashing idea! You'll try this with me, and tomorrow we'll...we'll go back to the market, all right? And I'll help. I'll perform another miracle, send more people home, supposing their homes still exist, we'll think of something, and then we can...I don't know. They do really quite impressive things with figs and dates, and fresh fish I believe, around these parts. We're in Khartoum, yes? You can...show me around. We'll go for lunch."

"You would do that?" Crowley inquired, staring helplessly over the tops of his glasses.

"Of course I would, I'm an angel. I'd just not do it to foment, I would...I would do it to spread joy. Same action, different reason!"

_You're spreading so much fucking joy that I'm drowning in it, and I don't know why that hurts so much. _

Crowley took a deep breath. He snapped his fingers and a little pot was boiling on the newly lit hearth, with the vanilla pod, milk, some sugar, grain alcohol, and just a pat of butter in for good measure. Crowley didn't cook, but he did mix drinks, and this wasn't so very different. The smell soon wafted through the room, exotic and floral with an enticing sweetness. He could see why the angel liked this. It smelled like who Aziraphale was, on a ethereal plane.

"You didn't have to do that!" Aziraphale clucked. "No more miracles and I mean it! Let me just...I'll see to it, all right?"

"All right," Crowley whispered.

For hundreds of years afterward, he couldn't smell vanilla without remembering. How Aziraphale had just sat there, talking a mile a minute until Crowley fell back to sleep, floating on fumes and pain and heated milk, and the next day the angel's eyes glowed eggshell blue when he miracled another six children hundreds of miles away, _free,_ and he gave Crowley a smile with just the side of his perfect mouth, and that was enough, wasn't it?

It would have to be enough.


End file.
